Nannade spent most of her time in the sewers, hiding in dark corners, following cult members on their way to errands and listening in on conversations. So far, she had not found an entrance to any sort of temple or base anywhere, but she knew it had to be there somewhere, most likely hidden by magic or simply by design. Her own entrance to the sewers she had disguised well. A few more crates from the storage were repurposed as a door and a layer of compacted soil made discovery from the outside unlikely. The captive stayed uncooperative and every time Nannade gave her food and emptied her bucket, an idea stung in the back of her head. She knew so many ways to cause people pain, in low doses her venom could be used, for example, but Nannade told the serpent no. This was no time to be cruel just yet. Like this, Nannade spent two more days underground, exploring the vast sewer system, recording cult activities and writing down their equipment, looks and size, to hopefully be able to estimate the size of the cult.
And so it came that one day, Nannade happened to be in the right place at the right time to witness an offering being brought through the sewers. A cultist in usual garb – a dark red robe with a white trim and a golden phoenix stitched on the chest – was leading two cultists in light guard gear – padded jacket, iron helmet, short spear and short sword – who were holding the woman by both arms while a third was walking behind her with his spear to her back. Nannade could not see the woman from where she was. She dashed into a parallel tunnel in order to get ahead of the group. Nannade was sure of the route they were going to take. Maybe she could finally see them opening the secret door.
She was right, she could intercept the five as she had thought. From the distance, in an intersecting tunnel, she observed them pull the woman further into the sewer system. Nannade finally got a good look at the offering. Although she was blindfolded, gagged and her hands bound, she recognized her. It was Gracia. Nannade’s heart froze.
Within a split second, a dozen approaches, scenarios and possibilities ran through her head. What spells did she have prepared? Which of the guards should she take out first? Can the robed cultist work their god’s miracles? How well could she hold her own against four? Would a Flooding Shadows spell give her enough time to grab Gracia and run back out?
Nannade tried to assemble a plan, but her head failed her. She could only watch as they pushed her further down the tunnels, towards their Lord's maws.
No, she had to help Gracia. She had shown her so much decency and kindness although she was in a difficult situation herself.
But Nannade could not just run down there and take them on. She did not yet have enough information and alerting the cult to her plans could jeopardize her entire work so far.
Neither could she do nothing. Saving Gracia was her duty.
Nannade was no saviour, she was a judge and executioner.
She was more than what the serpent had made her. She was a person, not a cruel bystander.
If she had used pain to acquire more information, she might just have put an end to the cult by now.
The group had long passed down the tunnels and Nannade snapped back to reality. She hurried after them, she could at least watch them enter the temple, that much she knew. They came to a dead end Nannade had already mapped. From the distance that Nannade was comfortable staying at, she could not exactly see what they were making, but the robed cultist took some sort of wooden object and banged it against the wall at one point. The stones of the wall started to slide out of the way to reveal a hidden passageway. Now was Nannade’s time. She was sure she could make it if she hurried, even if the stones started to re-arrange right now, she could make it.
She should not risk her entire mission, her own life and the lives of Elissa and Garetas, just for some beggar woman who showed kindness to her once.
Nannade ignored her niggling doubts and made a dash for it. She had already had an Invisible Fist in her hand when she made it through the closing hole in the wall. She held it outstretched and snapped her fingers. The group of five had turned around, but the paper had not gone up in flames yet. Again, she snapped her fingers, with greater pressure in her mind. This time, Ssil complied and the paper went up in flames.
The fist hit the guard behind Gracia. The robed cultist yelled a command at the guards and hurried the third one along to drag the offering faster down the corridor.
Nannade called out to Gracia, and she heard her, Nannade could tell by her increased struggle against her binds and captors. She tried to scream something to her through the gag.
Then Nannade drew and threw one of her throwing knives at the second guard, but it was deflected by his metal helmet. She drew another knife, but kept it in her left.
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The first guard had gotten up again and together with the second, they blocked the corridor with their broad shoulders.
An alarm was rung. The other cultists quickly dragged Gracia around a corner and were out of sight. Shortly afterwards, more cultists with dagger’s or spears came rushing into the corridor.
Nannade looked around, she was outmanned, she had maybe twenty feet to the now closed hole in the wall. She knew she still had a Stone Grind under her belt.
She started her slow retreat, sure to let none of the guards’ spears come too close. Out of a door behind her, a robed cultist with a dagger came into the corridor and lunged at her. She dodged, but the new combatant distracted her. She could still fend off the spears with her right, as long as Ssil kept the dagger at bay with the left.
She did well, but she could no longer retreat as the dagger was still behind her. She tried to tell Ssil to end him, but instead she dodged, pressed her to the wall, the robed cultist had lunged at her again. Both Nannade and Ssil used the opportunity and retaliated. Both dagger and knife penetrated the cultist’s side, meanwhile one of the spearmen had attacked Nannade at the moment the dagger could no longer guard Nannade's right side. The spear cut deep into her thigh and she had to suppress a pained cry. Her legs gave in, but she managed to get up and shove the bleeding cultist out of the way. It was time to run.
Nannade made it to the wall and the Stone Grind was ready. It had a short range and created only a small hole to slip through, but she managed it just barely. The guards tried to follow her, unable to squeeze their broad and burdened bodies through the narrow passage in the wall. Nannade had already fled into the darkness of the sewers.
They could still follow her by the trail of blood. She was out of Flooding Shadows, Stone Grinds, she still had Constrictors and Invisible Fists. She found a simple healing spell. She hid in a corner, the guards were still somewhat behind. Her exertion had pressed quite a lot of blood from the wound. The spells quickly sealed the wound, not necessarily healing it.
Her next task would be loosing the pursuers. She was close to an exit she had already mapped. She would have no luck in opening it, she had not the right magical keys to do so, but the was an inlet nearby.
She found the exit, a staircase upwards, and next to it, the inlet, a tight pipe upwards through which in the old days the effluence of the people above would drain into the sewers. Nannade squeezed her head in. She could feel her joins pop and slide apart, twisting and stretching her tendons and filaments, but the voice in the back of her head spurned her onward. All the way in she squeezer her entire body, not even her toes were poking out of the end anymore.
It was tight and dark, nothing was to be seen and all Nannade could hear was her own heartbeat and breath. At any point, a sharp spear tip could find its way into the pipe, and she would be powerless to do anything against it or even defend herself.
She did not know how long she had been in there; it could have been hours or even the entire day for all she could tell. She had a lot of time to think. And so did Ssil. She made Nannade understand how close they had been to death, how irrational she had acted. Gracia was dead because of her. Not because she failed in her foolish attempt to save her, but because she refused to apply the necessary means to acquire the information faster. The time for mercy had passed. Ssil would show Nannade how to wield pain as elegantly as she wielded the quill, and as accurately as she shot her arrows.
Finally, she felt safe enough to slide back out again. Her body reassembled itself from the sack of loose bones that it felt like, and assumed itsNannade-shaped exterior again. She stood in the silent darkness of the sewers. The stale air down here felt almost fresh to Nannade after being stuck in the inlet with her own breath.
She made her way back. She had to evade quite a few patrols on her way. They had increased security. She had vastly overestimated her own prowess, especially against several combatants. Her fights before had been lucky; the bandits on the road were idiots, not trained and steeled men. Garetas was unprepared and holding back. She realized just winging it in combat would be no winning strategy. She needed to get her body in tune with Ssil, so they can wield it properly. It would no longer be as easy to enter the temple from now on. She had squandered a great opportunity on nothing.
She felt broken and scolded as she finally came back to the bath house, all seemed well here. Nannade's captive was glad to finally receive her meal of salted fish and raw potatoes, and she could tell that Nannade had been roughed up. She seemed awfully pleased by that. Nannade wanted to break the bitch’s face and batter her flat on the stone walls, but a sharp thought shot this thought from the back of her mind.
Violence is crude; pain is graceful. Injury heals; agony imprints.
All Nannade had strength left for was fall on her blanket and roll in tight. She felt alone again. She never talked much with Gracia, but at least she was someone she knew, sort of. She let her only ally die. Even Telliduso, the friendliest man she had met in a very long time, was more of an enemy to her right now. And she probably brought him into trouble soon. The cult had spies in the gangs and they were sure to assume he helped her.
Many troubling thoughts haunted her. She suddenly became very aware of the feet upon feet of soil, rubble and bones that lay above her. She was buried, deep underground, inside a rotting corpse, far from home.